Leaving Australia

I vaguely planned to travel South East Asia for the next six months, heading north through Indonesia and Malaysia and into Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos, hopefully taking wonderful photographs and basking in island life.

To help fund this trip, I decided to launch an online print store to sell a small selection of pieces as beautiful fine-art prints, something I feel is becoming less and less appreciated as we consume all of our media on a screen.

I spent weeks researching drop-shipping services so that I could efficiently ship orders to customers without having to physically visit a lab which would be impossible whilst travelling. Once I'd narrowed in on a suitable service and started designing the store front, it was time to pack up my life again and head to new shores.

A stressful couple of months trying to organise my life, get my to-do list to a minimum and also actually enjoy the Australian summer meant I hadn't really put any time into my SE Asia planning; I knew which direction I wanted to travel and I had a one-way flight and accommodation booked in Bali, but that was it. It turns out you should probably put a little more thought into these things because when I tried to check-in for my flight, they told me I needed a flight booked out of Indonesia as well for visa reasons, and I ended up missing my flight!

That's all very easy to write down in a paragraph, but this was one of the most challenging and draining months of my life. So many things were going wrong instead of right, and being stuck at the airport with my life in a backpack and not being allowed on my flight really took it out of me. So, in a complete frenzy, I booked the next flight to London, spent 16 hours waiting in the airport contemplating what I'd done, and then sat on two planes for 24 hours across the planet.

Giclée prints are available in 4"x6", 8"x12", 10"x15"

Back In Blighty

I arrived back to a cold, grey England at the beginning of April and I'm still trying to adjust to my unexpected migration. I decided to move to Brighton which was absolutely the right choice, and I really can't complain about life here; I'm living with three talented female artists in Hove, working four days a week at a great coffee shop and I'm surrounded by a thriving art scene, bustling beaches, and Summer so far has been fantastic.

This energising city has enabled me to locate top print lab Spectrum Photographic who will be Giclée-printing all of my works on Hahnemühle Fine-Art paper which look incredible on the wall, as well as launch the online store front to browse and purchase prints. The selection is currently limited to a few photographs whilst I send more film negatives away to be drum-scanned, but will be expanding very soon.

Print Giveaway

To celebrate the launch of my print store and mailing list I was so excited to host my first print giveaway! Congratulations to Holly and Natalie for each winning an 8" x 12" print of "When Will I See You Again"! (Watch the draw here.)

It feels great to get all that off my chest - thanks for being here! If you want to to stay up-to-date with important news and offers, you can subscribe to my new mailing list at the bottom of my contact page. I'd really love to hear your thoughts in the comments below too, or any images you'd like to see available as a print!

Back in October, Mark & I left Melbourne to embark on a 5-week road trip around Australia in Stanley the Mitsubishi Verada. This was one hell of a journey; we covered massive distances across 5 states, visited some ridiculously beautiful beaches and magical sites, and best of all Stanley didn't break down on us once.

The road took us from Melbourne up through Alice Springs to Kakadu National Park, across the Northern Territory to Broome, down the coast of Western Australia and back across the Nullarbor Plain to Melbourne - 14,000km in 5 weeks and hitting temperatures of 45ºC.

Highlights have to be taking a dip in natural swimming holes and pristine oceans, befriending wild kangaroos on the beach, and sleeping amongst the gum trees under the stars every night. I took waaay too many photos on both 35mm and 120 film which you can find on my Travel Portfolio and Australian Road Trip series respectively, or head over to my Instagram for every photo and video!

Here's a small selection of favourites, I hope you'll enjoy the journey.

After 6 months living and working in Melbourne, I was faced with the decision of whether to extend my visa for a second year. To be eligible for the second-year visa in Australia I had to complete 88 days of farm work which is somewhat frustrating having got finally got on my feet only to up and leave again, but also provides an opportunity to see a part of the country I never would otherwise.

After a month of searching for a suitable place and going back and forth wondering if I was making the right choice, I was approved for a position in the rural town of Swan Hill in Victoria and packed up and left within 24 hours.

I was required to live in a shared house right next door to the local Maccas with other international backpackers which was very far from the comfort of the house I'd left in Melbourne. "It's all part of the experience" became a regular phrase in my head, although rats and grimy wallpaper aren't exactly ideal.

In the same way a convict uses their time in prison to buff up, I wanted to use my time away to train myself on medium format film, with a Rolleiflex 3.5T and some Fuji Provia 100. I had dreamed of collecting a series of portraits of the locals here, but I think my lack of desire to be in this town resulted in turning my camera away from the people and toward the suburban backdrop surrounding me.

Every day for over 3 months I walked the same 20 minute route to work in sweltering 40C heat, and I spent my spare time wandering the single high street of shops, suburban streets, and along the Murray river, documenting the dry, deserted urban landscapes under the harsh summer sun.

My lack of connection to the town has made it feel like I was never really there at all, and I think the scarce signs of life in these photographs reflect that; a distant observer; a temporary ghost.